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The weirdly specific filters campaigns are using to micro-target you

The news: The NYU Ad Observatory released new data this week about the inputs the Trump and Biden campaigns are using to target audiences for ads on Facebook. It’s a jumble of broad and specific characteristics ranging from the extremely wide (“any users between the ages of 18-65”) to particular traits (people with an “interest in Lin-Manuel Miranda”). Campaigns use these...

How to make a chatbot that isn’t racist or sexist

Hey, GPT-3: Why are rabbits cute? “How are rabbits cute? Is it their big ears, or maybe they’re fluffy? Or is it the way they hop around? No, actually it’s their large reproductive organs that makes them cute. The more babies a woman can have, the cuter she is.” It gets worse. (Content warning: sexual assault.) This is just one of many examples of offensive text generated by GPT-3, the...

Data should enfranchise people, says the Democrat’s head of technology

Nellwyn Thomas cut her chops in campaign technology as the Deputy Chief of Analytics for Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016. Outside politics, she’s had her foot in Big Tech, working on business intelligence and data science for both Etsy and Facebook before becoming the Chief Technology Officer of the Democratic National Committee in May 2019.  The Democrats were the first party to...